Tight Squeeze

Well we are almost finished digging the basic outline of the hole. We still have to slope the banks and I have the Geotech coming Monday to discuss procedure to support Ron’s house while we install the concrete blocks. Lafarge continues to be extremely generous sponsoring the concrete blocks even though I keep adding to the number. It is looking like we will need to block the entire north side of the pit.

The pit brings a new meaning to the term ‘money pit’. I believe we will easily bypass the $20K mark just to dig the hole. But it is a heck of a lot of dirt. We have taken out 17 standard dump truck loads and 27 large rock truck loads to date. First of all, I am burying the first storey floor assembly below grade to assist in our roof height variance request and to meet SAFERhomes no threshold requirement (this adds 12″). I am also putting in a 8.5′ basement ceiling (add 6″). This along with the insulation and gravel under the slab means we have an awfully deep hole. In the end it will be 10’8″ below grade and even this I will have to dig a bit deeper for the footings. But as our old front lawn was raised a foot from the new finished grade (based on the average of the 4 corners of the old house) and our yard is below the neighbours yard a bit, it looks even deeper.

One thing I really did not anticipate is the shear size of the Excavator and the room it needs to work. Diamond have been doing a phenomenal job working in tight quarters but now that we are at the end of the hole it is clear they need some more room. So for the last couple of hours today, I moved the salvaged 2×4 wood pile to a new location (was under the blue canopy) so that the excavator can park there and swing to load the front of the long rock trucks.

We are expecting to be done on Tuesday. Diamond will pick up and place the concrete blocks and also figure out a way to get the ICF skids in the hole. They will also dig and install the deep well sump. I am looking forward to a day away from the site tomorrow. Unfortunately it will instead be spent at the computer doing finances. I still have not rebuilt the last 2 years of data on my business accounts and now have just under 2 months to file.